ARE YOU BORN AGAIN or are you lost?
This was the question put to the congregation at Help Bless Ministries by Prophet Harold Broomes during a recent service.
Stressing that “there are people who come to church, read the Bible, pray and even pay tithes and offerings, Broomes noted that “while these things are good and should be practised, there is something more important than doing all these things”.
“If you are doing all these things and have never received Christ,
you are still lost. You must be born again,” he said.
“Unless you have been born again God is going to say to you, ‘depart from me, I never knew you because you never had a relationship with Jesus Christ’.
“You may have a relationship with the pastor and the people in the church. You hide behind that facade and make people believe that all is well, but Jesus said to Nicodemus, ‘you must be born again’.”
Taking his text from St John 3:1-8, the story of Nicodemus, Broomes said man’s natural birth – the result of conception – “is a birth of the flesh,” but being born again “can only come about through the denouncing of sin and acceptance of Jesus Christ”.
He said that although Nicodemus was by all means a knowledgeable man who knew the law, he was spiritually blind and void of understanding.
“Here was a brilliant man who felt he knew it all. When he came to Jesus, he addressed him as rabbi [which was the right thing to do]. One would have thought that a man with such knowledge who knew so much about the law would have been right with God.”
Broomes said Jesus had to make it clear to Nicodemus that being born of the spirit was vital to “seeing” the kingdom of God.
He also noted that “being born again cannot be skipped, as it is the number one ingredient in the Christian faith.”
“You cannot be a Christian unless you are born again,” he emphasized.
“Religion will put scales over your eyes. Nicodemus was religious. Your first birth does not qualify you to see the Kingdom of God because flesh produces flesh,” Broomes pointed out.
“When we come to Jesus by faith and accept him into our lives by faith, we step into the Kingdom of God. . . . Right then, our eyes become open,” he explained.
He said that the water referred to here was not water baptism but rather, the water is the Word of God – St John 17:17.
“It takes more than water in a pool or sea to wash away sins,” he taught. He said by accepting Jesus Christ, an individual accepts “the Word”, for Jesus is the Word in flesh.
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